


Piper's Gamble

by st4rlabsforever (omaken)



Category: The Flash (TV 2014)
Genre: Barry can be a little jealous, But just a little, M/M, Multi, Pre-OT3, because why not
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-31
Updated: 2016-03-31
Packaged: 2018-05-30 05:57:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,876
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6411598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omaken/pseuds/st4rlabsforever
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It took Barry a full twenty-four hours to realize it.</p><p>‘It’ being the wild chemistry between Cisco and Hartley that seemed to have blossomed overnight.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Piper's Gamble

**Author's Note:**

> fill for the prompt: "Barry gets jealous about Cisco and Hartley being close now that the time line changes"

It took Barry a full twenty-four hours to realize it.

‘It’ being the wild chemistry between Cisco and Hartley that seemed to have blossomed overnight. Apparently, he had missed a lot over the past year because when the rogue meta that they had been tracking had somehow managed to sneak her way into the Cortex (despite Cisco swearing up and down that the security was ‘new and improved’), Cisco had knocked her out cold with a sonic wave before Barry had even had a chance to move, which was an impressive feat in and of itself.

And then Caitlin and Harry were moving to transport her to the pipeline and Hartley was congratulating Cisco and giving his shoulder a squeeze and ruffling his hair. The change in Hartley was just about the closest Barry got to experiencing whiplash these days. He was the only one who remembered his organs nearly being sheared apart by the ‘Pied Piper’ after all, unless Cisco was holding back on what he retained from the old timeline.

“That’s…new,” Barry ventured tentatively when he finally recovered enough from his shock to form coherent words.

“Wait, you don’t remember? I thought when you changed the timeline you’d be caught up on what you missed.”

Barry shook his head mutely.

“Anyway, yeah, Hartley’s been with us for a while now and he’s helping me figure out these powers. He’s honestly been a huge help,” Cisco said as he gave said man a small smile.

Barry was about to question further because there was so much he had missed, but Hartley had dragged Cisco off to tinker with some equations or other that had completely gone over his head when the two of them had tried to explain.

He was left alone in the Cortex to ponder the dynamics of the ‘new Team Flash,’ as Cisco was apparently insisting on calling them now.

 

* * *

 

 

Still, another week passed had before the breadth and depth of everything Barry had missed had dawned on him.

Apparently, Cisco and Hartley were tight as peas in a pod now. The two of them had weekly movie nights together (Barry thought Wrath of Khan was _their_ thing, but evidently it wasn’t anymore) and spent all hours of the night running experiments in Cisco’s lab. Then there were the team outings, where Hartley was a surprisingly good singer and the night more often than not ended up with Cisco dragging the former on stage for a duet (apparently, _On the Regular_ was ‘their jam’).

It was jarring in more ways than one. On the one hand, Barry was happy that Cisco had found another friend who just ‘got’ him on that level. He remembered Cisco’s big speech about how difficult high school and college had been for him from a social perspective. Hell, Barry had been in a similar position all his life, so he knew what it meant to finally make those connections. But on the other hand, he couldn’t help but feel envious of Hartley. There was effectively a one-year gap in his memory. From the information he had gleaned from the others, things had mostly turned out the same this time around, but he couldn’t help but feel that Hartley had taken his place as Cisco’s best friend. The two of them even had a secret handshake, which was a level of affection that Barry hadn’t known the villain-turned-hero to be capable of, nor was it a point that Barry had ever reached in his friendship with Cisco.

He really should’ve talked to Cisco about it, but he couldn’t bring himself to. Instead, he found himself dropping by Caitlin’s lab after hours one night.

“Everything okay?” she asked when she noticed him standing silently in the doorway.

“Cisco and Hartley seem…close,” he blurted, praying that he sounded far more casual than he felt.

Caitlin gave him a smile. “I’m glad you changed the timeline. There was a lot of bad blood between them after everything with Wells, but whatever you did really helped them patch things up.”

“Me too,” he said hurriedly. “It’s just…I guess, are me and Cisco okay?”

“Huh…?”

 _Come on, use your words, Barry._ He rubbed awkwardly at the back of his neck. “I mean, I don’t really have any memory of what happened after I got the solution to the speed formula from Wells, but it feels like me and Cisco are less close now…right?”

“No? I think you’re gonna have to spell it out for me, because I’m not following,” Caitlin said with a raised eyebrow.

Now, no one had ever told him that he was good with his words and he knew he was probably embarrassing himself, but he couldn’t help plowing head-on into the proverbial storm.

“…I thought _I_ was supposed to be his best friend.” He knew he sounded petulant, but he had already laid the rest of his cards on the table – why stop now?

“He can’t have more than one best friend?”

“No! The ‘best’ is supposed to be superlative!”

Barry had been told more than once by Iris that he took labels too seriously, but he couldn’t help it. When he said she was his ‘best friend,’ he meant it. She had held that title for almost all of his life, and after all they had been through, there would always be a special place in his heart for her somewhere between ‘family,’ ‘friend,’ and also something more than that. But lately, he had come to the realization that Cisco fully occupied the title of ‘best friend’ now. The conversation with him just before he had gone back to the night it all went wrong had really driven it home.

 _You’re my best friend, Barry_.

There were so many things Barry had wanted to say to that, and in hindsight he wasn’t sure why he hadn’t. But sitting in his living room that night waiting to jump in and save his mom, his new life at STAR Labs – fighting crime, becoming a hero, having friends besides Iris for the first time in his life and most of all, having _Cisco_ in his life – had flashed before him and he couldn’t bring himself to change the timeline. God help him, but he couldn’t.

Cisco had inched himself into Barry’s life so gradually between Star Trek marathons and whispered declarations of ‘I have been and always shall be your friend’ until it had hit Barry like a freight train that night in the Allen house and he had been left reeling from it.

“Wait, are you _jealous_?” Caitlin ripped him out of his thoughts, somewhat incredulous and with a sly grin on her face.

“No! Of course not!” He wasn’t. Right? He was genuinely delighted on Cisco’s behalf, but maybe he missed being Cisco’s center of attention. After a week, which had really felt like eons and eons to him, it felt like he was missing a vital piece of his life. It had only become more apparent as the days dragged on.

“Okay. Well, they’re not dating, in case you were wondering.”

“I wasn’t, but thanks,” Barry said, flustered and acutely aware that his cheeks were burning.

He dashed out of the lab even more confused than when he had entered it.

 

* * *

 

 

“He has a little crush on you.”

Cisco spit his drink out. “What?”

“Thanks for that,” Hartley said dryly as he did he best to wipe off his shirt. “And it’s obvious, isn’t it, Paco?”

No, it wasn’t at all, but Hartley only laughed when Cisco told him so. “Have you actually seen the way he looks at you?”

“No?” Cisco said as he took a swig of his wine and swished it around his mouth. “Trust me, I’d have noticed.”

He’d hinted strongly to Barry in the first few months he’d known him that he’d had more than platonic feelings for him, but the message had been loud and clear when he’d come up against a brick wall with Iris’s name etched in every slab. He had just been content to have Barry’s friendship and been too afraid of ruining what they already had. Plus, after Linda and Patty, he figured it wasn’t just an Iris-thing, but rather Barry just wasn’t interested in him that way.

“So you do have feelings for him, then?” Hartley quirked an eyebrow.

This conversation was beginning to feel like a game of chess. Hartley had him backed against a wall and was about to go for the checkmate. Cisco’s lack of an answer must have spoken for itself – and damn Hartley for being so good at reading him, he really had no idea how he did it – because Hartley was smirking now.

"I'll prove it to you."

Cisco rolled his eyes. “And how do you plan to do that?”

Hartley looked like the cat that got the canary, and Cisco would’ve been lying if he’d said it didn’t unnerve him just a little – the guy could probably take over the world if he put his mind to it. He was just grateful that Hartley was batting for them now.

 

* * *

 

 

It was the next day when Barry realized he was more than a little jealous of Hartley, and not in the platonic, ‘best-friends-with-Cisco’ way either. He was in the midst of a session on the cosmic treadmill as the two scientists were checking over some new algorithm or other, Hartley perched over Cisco’s shoulder and murmuring in his ear.

And Hartley’s arm was creeping lower and lower, first hovering over the other’s breast, then down his stomach, then finally down even further.

Barry didn’t realize he was airborne until his back was colliding with the pile of boxes behind him.

 

* * *

 

 

Cisco and Hartley were working a recon mission to gather information on a meta who had a penchant for fine art. The rest of the team had decided unanimously that Barry should sit this one out since he decidedly lacked that subtle touch, which he was still a little sore about.

He knew the two of them would be fine if anything went wrong, so it wasn’t their safety he was concerned about. He just didn’t understand why they had to pose as a couple. _He_ could’ve done that, no problem. When he told Caitlin that, she only rolled her eyes and shared a look with Iris.

None of that was important, though, because he presently felt his blood pressure steadily rising as Hartley shamelessly flirted with Cisco over the comms for all of them to hear.

“You know, if you were _really_ grateful, you’d show me in bed tonight,” Hartley purred.

Iris snorted and covered her mouth, Harry looked on with impressive indifference, and Joe chortled while simultaneously facepalming.

Caitlin let out a concerned little squeak, and when Barry looked down, he saw that the tablet he was holding had been incinerated, sparks of yellow and red electricity still flying from his fingertips.

 

* * *

 

 

Barry broke the next day and flashed Cisco into an empty alley as he was humming casually on his way to CCPD.

“Hey, what gives?!”

“Sorry,” he winced. _You can do this,_ he told himself. “I just wanted to make sure everything was okay with you.”

“Why wouldn’t it be?” Cisco looked adorably confused as he worked his tongue around the lollipop he was holding. Barry tried not to think about just how much that wasn’t helping with his problem. He had to ignore it, though, because there was a more pressing matter to attend to.

“If someone was coercing you or – or threatening you, you know you can come to me, right? It’s what I’m here for…”

“Threatening – what the hell are you talking about, dude?”

“Hartley!” Barry shouted somewhat frantically, because apparently he really had to spell it out. “I don’t know. He’s – it feels like he’s taking advantage of you.”

Cisco was giving him a very, very strange look now and Barry couldn’t help but think that he had somehow completely misjudged the situation. Cisco took pity on him, sighing before saying “Look, I know it’s hard to process. I mean, it still freaks me out sometimes, but Hartley’s one of the good guys now. For real.”

When Cisco walked out of the alley and resumed humming the Mission Impossible theme, Barry wasn’t any less frustrated.

 

* * *

 

 

Cisco finally realized that there might have been a problem at about the time Barry challenged Hartley to a duel. It hadn’t been phrased that way, of course. It was supposed to be a friendly sparring match to help the two of them ‘train,’ but Cisco knew full well how that would end.

”Are you convinced now?” Hartley asked. “Because I’d appreciate it if you could call off your shadow before he fries me alive.”

He was leaning against the doorframe to Cisco’s workroom looking particularly smug.

That smirk used to bother him a lot, but Cisco figured it wasn’t so bad now that he got to know the guy. They’d had a…well they’d had _something_ going after Hartley had turned over a new leaf. While post-Time Wraith Hartley had been worlds apart from the dick whose first words were to disparage Cisco’s wardrobe choices all those years ago, the two of them had decided that they were too similar to make a long-term commitment work. They were both quick to anger, like flames warring for dominance even when their end goal was the same. A major case of too many chefs in the kitchen, if Cisco had to summarize it. In the end, they’d agreed that being friends was for the best.

Barry, on the other hand, felt like his other half. They complemented each other perfectly – he hadn’t in recent memory (or in his entire life, really) remembered fitting together so well with anyone else. Even their powers seemed tailor-made for each other.

The only thing that really surprised him was that he had somehow missed that Barry had returned his feelings, and lord knows he was looking. Barry was a hard read, though, given that he was the most affectionate friend Cisco had ever had, even moreso than his parents, though that wasn’t saying much.

Cisco sighed and his next words physically pained him, but Hartley had won fair and square. “Fine, you win.”

“You should really stop it though, ‘cause when he breaks your face in, you’re only gonna have yourself to blame.”

Hartley ignored him. “So you’re going to talk to him?”

Cisco waved a hand in dismissal as he shrugged on his jacket and walked resolutely out the door.

“Do you think he’d be down for a threesome?” Hartley shouted after him, then laughed as he dodged the pen that was lobbed in his direction.

 

* * *

 

 

Cisco found Barry moping in his CSI lab, alternating between tossing a stress ball in the air and hurling small bolts of lighting at his board of evidence.

“Someone’s gonna see you doing that, you know.”

Barry shrugged. “Hey Cisco.”

Cisco took a deep breath, and when Barry finally paused long enough to look at him, said “I could give you a whole big speech, but I’m just gonna cut to the chase.”

And then he was walking up to Barry and kissing him like his life depended on it. After a second, Barry was responding in kind. When they finally surfaced for air, he was giving Cisco an adorably confused look.

“Don’t,” Cisco said, putting a finger on Barry’s lips. “I’m gonna let you figure this one out on your own.”

Barry frowned. “You and Hartley. I thought for sure you guys were a thing…”

Cisco didn’t grace that with a response.

“You and Hartley aren’t dating?”

Getting closer, Barry.

“I mean, Caitlin told me you guys weren’t, but there was all the touching and flirting and…anyway you’re not dating.”

Cisco nodded.

“And you kissing me. Is that a new development? Not a new development, then,” he corrected when he saw Cisco’s expression.

“I really didn’t know…” Barry whispered. “How long?” He sounded like a lost poppy.

“Kind of since the day we met, if I’m being honest.”

“Dude…” Barry said in wonder. “Why didn’t you say something?”

Really? First there had been Iris, then when he’d almost gotten over her, Linda had swooped in to save the day, followed by more moping on Barry’s part when Iris had rejected him the second time around, and finally Patty once Barry had picked up the pieces.

Barry deflated when Cisco explained it to him. “This is…new to me. When I saw you and Hartley, it got me thinking that that could be us…that I _wanted_ that to be us. I guess I kinda went a little crazy,” he said sheepishly.

“Don’t apologize, we got there in the end. Now what do you say we get out of here?”

Cisco blinked and they were in his bedroom and Barry was standing in front of him completely naked.

“Little fast there, Bar.”

“It’s Hartley’s fault. Can I?” he asked, reaching toward the fabric of Cisco’s shirt.

Cisco nodded, and Barry was undressing him at record speed.

 

* * *

 

 

The next morning, Caitlin divided up a thick wad of twenty-dollar bills among Iris, Hartley, and herself while Joe, Harry, and Wally looked on forlornly.

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this way quickly, but no one can stop me from shipping barry/cisco/hartley now…


End file.
